The Desolation of Harry Potter
by ElegantlyDone
Summary: Unknowingly carrying the title of Master of Death, Harry Potter expected to be ushered into the afterlife as he breathed his final breath. Such a luxury however, was not granted. Cursed to forever walk the mortal realms, he eventually found himself in a most curious world, reborn not as a human, but something far stranger. Who would break first? Him, or the world?
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

Death is straightforward.

It is, simply put, a departure from life.

However, there are several anomalous existences scattered across the universe who do not obey this fundamental law of nature. Amongst the ranks of eldritch entities, deific daemons and formless fiends, beholds the most curious creature: a wizard of humble origin.

This particular man had done much since the day he was conceived. In the very first of his countless lives he had defeated a Dark Lord and brought a stop to a hegemony that arose from prejudice and ignorance, bringing stability and peace to a nation that was on the brink of collapse. He was fortunate to live long enough until his lifeforce naturally expired in the unending passage of time, surrounded by friends and family as he drew his terminal breath.

His journey did not stop there however, for he was soon whisked away to countless worlds that were in dire need of liberation and succour, each one providing him with a difference facet of life. The crucible of each experience, a pre-eminent hero, a brave warrior, a venturous merchant, a humble carpenter, a loyal soldier, and many more, undergirded the growth of his spirit.

Though his valorous deeds echoed and rippled throughout time and space, if he could change one event in history, it would be stopping himself from becoming the Master of Death, a title that could only be bequeathed upon rightfully acquiring three of the rarest artifacts the world had to offer. Although he was harshly thrust into a state of infinite existence he was never bored, for he was neither immortal nor invincible, but rather unable to pass onto the afterlife – a lost spirit wandering the hinterlands of reality. This meant that every experience was original and fresh and was without a compelling reason for him to become jaded or to be consumed by boredom.

Harry James Potter found himself once again floating in the vastness of the cosmos, surrounded by a blanket of coruscant stars and spinning planets. Yet, in all their grandeur, they were not as they were, for each individual ball of rock and gas was changing dramatically in a never-ending process, from red giant to white dwarf, from gas cloud to nebula, from supernova to neutron star, and so on, in a sequence of events that had been initiated since the dawn of time and will keep doing so until the very last day.

 _Did someone poison me?_ Harry thought curiously as he glided effortlessly through a vortex of godless flames and spinning darkness.

Though the environment mimicked that of outer space, he could breathe just fine despite the lack of oxygen.

He then gave an exasperated sigh.

 _For shame, I was having so much fun._

His life of an accredited thespian had just come to an end. From the cleft of his mother he had been born a boy in the year 1564, right into an English household of playwrights. Having no shame about hiding his intelligence and talents, he was plunged into the world of art, where he was soon thrust into the limelight as the most promising dramatist to appear in history. He reached the age of fifty-one before a rival decided to loosen up the competition and become a murderer.

Shrugging to no one in particular, he hurtled silently through the void to his next grand adventure. Warm thermals pushed him gently heavenward in a seemingly never-ending spiral. A misty veil began to surround his eyes as a distant speck of light grew ever larger.

A hair-raising amalgamation of noises that sounded like bones cracking and skin tearing suddenly made itself known; his body was undergoing a most peculiar change. He was as of this moment still in the body of his previous world, a middle-aged man with a striking visage, defined by the sharpness of his face and the wrinkles of his brow. As each second passed however, he began to shrink in size, leaving behind his old body and gradually taking on the form of a baby: a process of accelerated metamorphosis. This sudden morphological change did not perturb nor frighten him in the slightest, for he had undergone this transformation many times before.

The dot of light that seemed so far away was now growing in size as he hurtled towards it, travelling at such a speed that time and space itself seemed to distort, bending a knee in submission to his presence.

 _How magnificent._ Harry thought dreamily as he approached the shimmering ball of light. Even if he wanted to describe how it looked like, he couldn't. It somehow humbled him and made him feel as if he was a simple mortal once again, not some time-worn celestial traveller.

He eventually grew closer and closer, and then finally, impact.

Thus, Harry James Potter began his life anew, once again.

* * *

Water and darkness.

These were the first two things his mind registered. His eyes opened as his limbs flexed in shock. He felt water instantly entering his gullet, up each nostril and encasing his entire body as he panicked. All rational thought flew out if his mind and without a conscious thought, a choice, the instincts of his body drove him to do what any must to survive: to swim to the surface as fast as possible.

His feet kicked as hard as they could as he wildly swam through viscous water that sought to drag him down and end his life before it even began. His efforts were rewarded for he quickly broke through the water's surface after swimming through what seemed like an endless stretch of water. It was almost pitch black, but he managed to orient himself appropriately, the water curiously no higher than his chest.

 _What a horrible start_. Harry thought in annoyance as he greedily gulped cool air into his lungs.

Before his mind could process any more information, he suddenly realized something very wrong with the situation. In nearly all of his previous experiences upon arriving onto other worlds, he would begin life as an unblemished baby, free from the harshness and afflictions of life. This time however, there was neither a midwife to pass him over to his mother to tenderly hold him, nor a father to crow in jubilation and raise him high into the air.

There was just him. And the dark pit.

His mouth felt weird, his tongue, even more so. Confused, he readied his mouth to speak, summoning whatever willpower he still possessed to make heads or tails of the situation. He tilted his head backwards and looked up – what he perceived was upwards – and whispered just a single word.

"Hello?"

He gave a violent start of surprise from the sound of his voice. Whenever he would try to communicate during the neonatal period of his lives, his words would be semi-unintelligible babbling until a few months had passed from his birth. He had always suspected it was the lack of control of the muscles in his mouth at that early of an age. This time however, the noise he produced was something unlike he had ever heard before. It was scratchy, rough and sounded as if something had just torn his oesophagus out and replaced it with layers of worn sandpaper.

Something was up.

As he blinked his eyes, the blurriness faded, and his surroundings grew crisper. At that very moment a foul stench hit his nose, one so pungent that he gagged and was jolted into acutely assessing his environment. He reached out in the darkness and ran a hand carefully over the top of the fluid he had been submerged in and quickly came to a disturbing conclusion.

 _This isn't water._

The coldness of the air was more apparent, stealing the warmth given to him by the foul concoction that he was bathing in. He wanted to use all his senses, to get a feel for what this was, but the noisome odour dominated the air and the chill froze his skin and what little brain power he could muster.

 _I'm in some sort of chamber._ He realized in astonishment after a few seconds of blind exploration, realizing this fact when the sloshing of the fluid echoed and resonated rather hair-raisingly around a hollow sounding chamber.

A dim light suddenly flickered into existence above him in the distance, one so far off that it seemed as if it was an eternity away. Like a moth drawn inexorably to flame, it invited him to begin crawling up the sides of the chamber to this faint source of illumination, his brain only now noting that the walled surfaces were not shear, but rather were craggy and convex.

His continued climbing was rudely interrupted when a dark silhouette suddenly loomed over him akin to a side that of an imposing edifice as it blotted out the distant spot of light. He then gave a squeak of panic when a set of large appendages reached out towards him, noting that that were easily bigger than his body as they grabbed him whole and wrenched him out of the gooey pit and into, arguably, an even darker room.

Even after leaving the area from where he once came, he still could not fully comprehend what was happening, for his wide eyes were seeing the world through a strangely blurred view, as if there were never ending sheets of water cascading over his waking eyes.

His body felt weirdly elongated; his arms and his legs felt disproportionate and awkward, but it soon did not matter in the slightest, for he was soon wrapped in something soft and carried high and far into the room to the fuzzy outlines of whom he assumed were his family members.

 _What's happening?_ Harry thought faintly, his senses too overloaded to form a coherent thought as murky figures towered over his tiny form.

He was then passed from figure to figure, each shadowy outline performing strange snakelike motions with their bodies and growling words of an unintelligible nature under their breaths, using a language so harsh and bizarre that it grated and stabbed at his heart.

The event transpired for a few more minutes, overstimulating his senses with chaotic murmurings that oddly resembled the hisses of snakes and growls of lions. Even though he couldn't understand a single word that was said, that was one word that was repeated over and over again while he was being passed around, the peculiar nuance of its utterance cementing itself into his brain.

He realized what it was: his name.

He mustered up all the strength he possessed and smiled contentedly, oddly noting that his gums were stretching way farther back than humanly possible. The name felt powerful, majestic and solemn, and was one he wholeheartedly approved of when mentally tested the enunciation of the strange word in his mind. With a tired sigh, he finally lost the battle against fatigue and drifted off to his first sleep in this strange new world as he repeated his name in his brain just one more time.

 _Smaug._

 _My name is Smaug._

* * *

 **A/N:** This story will be Harry-centric and will be dealing with his interactions with the denizens of Middle-earth after being reborn as a rather familiar dragon named Smaug, and how his simple presence would change and shape the events that are to come. This saga will be more focused on mature themes, specifically encapsulating the realities of hardship, loss, war, violence and death, with a focus on the middle-to-late stages of the Third Age in Middle-earth.

As always, I'd be more than delighted if you shared your thoughts on this with me!


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: The Nature of Dragons**

Nestled away at the edges of the world sat a mountain range named _Ered Mithrin_ , an expanse of grey crags and misshapen boulders that stretched far across the northern regions of Middle-earth. They housed peaks that were so high they almost kissed the heavens, covered with a rug of vibrant trees, fertile loam and bare tops that were scarfed and beribboned with snow.

If one traversed easterly across the mountain belt, they would soon realize that the ground gradually swerved into narrower topographies and dramatically changed into a much harsher landscape. Hard parched soil, blackened trees, charred shrubbery, and mounds of ash and dust were what instantly greeted the eye, replacing previous scenes of a bucolic nature.

A barren wasteland lay charcoal under the sallow sun, their feeble rays struggling to shine through broken layers of cloud that obscured this valley from the prying eyes of the world. This ruined land also had a name: The Withered Heath.

It was also the home of one Harry Potter.

Well, _home_ was perhaps not the right description for it, for that particular word conjures up images of pleasant company, warm food and soft beds in the mind's eye. Instead, the company was terrifying, the food was either raw or rotten, and beds as a concept were in a state of non-existence. This was perhaps due to fact that this place was a breeding ground for one of the most feared and terrifying entities that dwelled in this land.

Dragons.

Creatures that carried only hearts of heartlessness, marked by an overabundance of avarice and malice that coursed through their veins. Emboldened by the hardness of their scaly hides and the superiority of their vast intellect, they would often ravage any signs of civilization in the twisted hope of acquiring specific sets of war spoils: precious minerals, priceless artifacts, and nitid gold.

Lusting for such worldly goods was not within reason for such creatures, but their rapacity was what garnered them their infamous reputation throughout the land. That attribute aside, they are primarily and more notably feared for their desire for wanton destruction, something that had been well recorded in the annals of history.

In the First Age of Middle-earth, the deepest and darkest pits of Angband, the ancient fortress to a creature known as Morgoth, birthed forth dragons of calamity, Ancalagon the Black, and Glaurung, Father of Dragons. Both were equally majestic and terrifying in their own way, but under the experimentation and grooming of the first Dark Lord to ever exist, their names – and therefore, their entire species – was etched into the minds of all inhabitants of this world as portents of doom and weapons of destruction.

Perhaps the crux of the preamble shouldn't be left so late, but through laborious effort and careful observation, Harry quickly found out why he had been feeling so strange after he was shoehorned into his new state of existence: he was a dragonling. Not any old dragon, but an _Urulokë_ , or what he found soon out, drakes that housed the ability to breathe fire.

He initially assumed that all dragons could lick flames as his kin could, but he quickly observed others with more interesting and derivative features. Some dragons were wingless, some scaleless, some shaped like long worms, some quadrupedal, and some even breathed ice instead of fire. Despite such stark differences, the blackness of their souls was a constant amongst their ranks. He too – though not truly a dragon – could feel the thrall of dark that lined his heart. It was not a worry for him however, for he was inured and experienced against such mental strife and seductions, his past experience as a living Horcrux serving as a harsh lesson.

He was but a whelping at this juncture. Nascent red and gold spines ran from his neck to the tip of his tail, almost like a sail protruding from his back. Housing sharp, serrated meat-eating teeth designed to tear flesh from bones, and a forked tongue that was distinctly ophidian in nature, he looked strangely leonine. It made him chuckle sometimes, when he would glance upon his reflection in glassy pools of undisturbed water, for the combination of colours carried a nostalgic reminder of his youthful days in Gryffindor.

"Mother… food," Harry called out in a harsh, guttural and unknown language. His ocean-green eyes, glowing like gemstones that were embedded in an otherwise unbroken sheath scales, gazed with childlike supplication at a figure that seemed to be sleeping – and one was almost a hundred times his size.

An annoyed growl sliced through the air at the disturbance but not before a deer carcass was lobbed unceremoniously in his direction, of which he deftly avoided with a small flap of his wings. Hunger consuming and overriding all his other desires, he knelt down and sank his tiny fangs deep into the raw meat, savouring the food with his forked tongue as if he hadn't eaten in an eternity.

It had been three years since he had arrived into this strange new world. He assumed initially that he was still back on his planet he was born in, but quickly realized otherwise partly due to the fact that the dragons here differed to those back home. Most were terrifyingly intelligent and were accomplished polyglots, capable of mastering many unique forms of speech – unlike those of his old world which only spoke Parseltongue. How they accrued all this knowledge would forever be a mystery to him, for he never saw any of them perusing through ancients scrolls, studying decrepit grimoires, hoarding dusty tomes or consulting any other written work in the years he had been raised in this place.

He often had no clue what language he was speaking in, but he was taught a number of tongues, including one called _Westron_ , whom he was assured was a necessity to learn for he was told it was a lingua franca that current spanned nearly across the entire world.

Despite all the wisdom of his mother, she taught him naught but the art of speech. Knowledge about this world, its inhabitants, their cultures, the year they were in, potential enemies, and everything else were never brought up as conversational topics. As a consequence, he yearned for the day when he could muster enough strength to beat his undeveloped wings and breach the high walls of the cave he had been dwelling in for all this time.

Apart from briefly glancing upon the outside world when his mother carried him in her jaws on one special occasion, the boundaries of his world so far were demarcated by the lining of his abode. It almost resembled the inside of a volcano in some ways, due the fact that the only way in or out of his home was through a hole that pierced the roof. The cave's general shape was ovoid, the walls below the hole curving smoothly to the floor while the walls above arched a hundred feet up to giant stalactites and bat roosts.

Needless to say, these new conditions of Harry's state of living as a non-human were rather austere.

He had finally been weaned off his mother a month ago and was now moving onto solid food. The growth rate of dragons was… disappointing slow much to Harry's chagrin, for he was too accustomed to the quick life spans and rapid aging of humans. Upon hatching he was but the size of a watermelon, and after three years down the road he was only the size of a large dog.

After he had finished ravenously devouring his food, he looked upwards at his mother.

Her red scales gleamed under wayward rays of sunlight and were ones that were her pride and delight. Black streaks were shot through them, carrying a lustre than seemed strangely brighter than the sun itself. With teeth as sharp and cold as icicles that could rip through armour with the slightest of ease and deep violet eyes that seemingly swam with endless pools of wisdom, she was truly a sight to behold.

"When will I become as magnificent as you?" he murmured quietly under his breath.

A mighty voice rumbled above him.

"Eat well, little Smaug. You will grow yet."

His overheard mutterings of admiration earned him another slab of meat, one which looked considerably more fresh and tender than the last. Chest puffed up in glee and belly reignited with a sudden burst of renewed hunger, he was just about to dive into the new arrival of food before a small noise at the corner of the cave made itself known.

He started, only now remembering he was not the only dragonling of the clutch. There were three others, two females and one male, of which all hatched shortly after him.

He glanced guiltily at the hungry brothers and sisters of his brood out of the corner of his eye, hoping that they weren't old enough to understand the concept of blatant favouritism. None of them were able to speak coherently so far, though their eyes shined with keen perception. The reason why he only could formulate intelligible words was because of the accumulation of knowledge from his past lives, and the only reason why he could enunciate his words with such clarity was because of the sharpness of his mind and the strength of his will.

Now, in litters, there is always a runt. In nature, the mother will always turn a blind eye to the runt and funnel all her resources into only her strongest and most promising progeny to further the continuation of her species. In this litter however, everyone was the runt _but_ him.

He waited until his mother's eyes eventually closed before he surreptitiously tore of some of the meat with his razor-sharp claws and flung it toward in the direction of his siblings, making subtle hushing motions and praying that they could interpret his body language correctly. Harry held his breath as the flesh sailed silently through the air and slapped against the ground of the cave with a muted thud. Would his mother notice?

He cringed when his youngest sister gave a loud chirp of delight at his action, her maroon scales tinctured with iridescent vermillion hues vibrating in accordance to her excitement. Fortunate is seemed, did not smile upon him as his mother opened just one curious eye from the noise.

In an instant she realized what was going on and extended a massive claw high up into the air, only to bring it crashing it down on the seemingly innocuous chunk of flesh with a reverberating crash. When the dust finally settled, she then scooped it up in one grab and tossed it nonchalantly back at his feet.

Harry gave a saddened sigh from the clear message.

His mother was beautiful as she was cruel.

Harry pushed the food that had just been given back to him to the side even though there was still half of it left, his appetite instantly evaporating from the cries of outrage and sadness from his siblings that reached his ears. He knew that nature itself was taking course, but even he was unhappy with its toll.

The imposing figure above him then gave him a strange look, as if unable to comprehend his actions. The food was solely for him, so why did he give some away?

"Little Smaug, why does thee act as such?"

Harry paused for a second before padding slowly to her and curling up beside her body, basking in the gentle warmth she radiated. Her mother had never told him her name, and he often wondered why. On top of that, he hardly knew the names of his brother and sisters, for there was only one creature his mother deigned to talk to: him.

 _Do dragons even have the capacity for virtues such as acceptance or kindness?_ He thought with a small frown. _Surely, they must, for they are beings of conscience and sentience, are they not?_

Little did the red whelpling know, the dragons themselves as a race were created out of hatred by the entity known as Morgoth in the early stages of the Middle-earth. Into his living creation, this entity poured his cruelty, hatred and will to tyrannize all life, birthing forth a race that was ever-destined to be the enemy of the world.

Harry yawned sleepily before raising his eyes heavenward, his brilliant green-slitted pupils clashing against irises of dark and turbulent violet.

"What is better, mother?" he started in a tired voice, "To be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?"

Stormy pits that housed great pools of intelligence and cunning narrowed imperceptibly at his seemingly racial line of questioning.

"If one overcame their 'evil nature' through great effort, then are they not 'born good'?" his mother voice answered evenly, her sibilant tone of voice taking on a questioning tone at the end of her sentence.

"You're overestimating the impact that personal experience and one's environment has on an individual's character," Harry argued back after a second of thought.

A fearsome and majestic head shook silently at his naivety.

"Little Smaug, you presume determinism, which I believe we have every reason _not_ to presume," her strong voice floated downwards, cocooning him and sending him into a state of tranquillity.

Harry gave a thoughtful hum from the brevity and weight of his mother's words. If no one can truly be born evil, then were the Dementors, Basilliks, Chimeras and more of his old world born good? He was yet to outsmart his mother in a war of wits. Even though he had lost track of how old he was cumulatively, there was always one out there in the world that was smarter than him.

It is often folly to correlate age with wisdom, merely with experience.

He gave a large yawn once again, feeling as though energy was being constantly being drained out of him. He had just eaten his fill and now an all-consuming desire to drift to the land of the dreams was threatening to take hold of him. Such was his life since he hatched. All he did was eat or sleep. It would've been a rather monotonous state of existence if not for the intense and rigorous linguistic lessons that were interspaced between his other two modes of life.

Curled up and tucked against his mother, there seemed like there was nothing in the world but them. The wind neither swooped or howled, bestowing silence that warmly enveloped them whole. His mind stared to wander, evoking halcyon images of summer days gone by as they wrapped him in a blanket of his own thoughts, hopes and dreams.

A strange and powerful urge of wanderlust coursed through his veins as his mind teetered on the edge of shutting down. One day he would be free of this place, and when that fateful day comes, it would mark the first step in another grand journey – that for him, never truly ends.

* * *

 **A/N:** Hi folks. Thanks for your awesome comments and pointing out the typo in the last chapter! Just giving you guys a heads up. At the end of every chapter, I will try my best to give a detailed justifications about the choices I will make when deviating or adding on to the existing stuff we know from LoTR.

1) Tolkien never specified the language the dragons used for each other, only that they can learn other languages with relative ease. Although it was never explicit, we know that some form of draconic language exists. It will be used extensively and will be called _Kulkodar-Flas,_ which means 'dragon speak' in the Black Speech of Mordor.

2) It is never specified when Smaug was born, though there is high contention as to whether it was during the First-Age in Angband or hatched in the Third-Age in the Withered Heath. I have assumed the latter case. This is because he was shown to be roughly three centuries old when shown in the Hobbit, drawn from the lifecycle of prior dragons (Glaurung grew to adulthood in two hundred years). Draconic biology tells us maturity for a dragon takes roughly 100 years, as seen from The Silmarillion. Thus, it is only logical to assume he was never part of Morgoth's army and was hatched much later in time in the Withered Heath.

3) "There is no such thing as a good dragon". Born from the dark will of Morgoth, they are creatures of pure darkness. However, this story will explore the boundaries of such a claim and put it to the test.


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: The Power of Language**

Cold air hit a young dragon's face like a blast from a cannon. For a few seconds, he was blind, and then his eyes cleared just as fast, turning wide and alight with rapturous joy as he took in the sight of the world from an aerial view.

It had taken nearly two years but through sheer determination and grit – and gluttony, Harry had finally gained an adequate amount of muscles on his bones to carry him on his first successful flight. The skies were not his alone to claim however, for other creatures of all nature littered the sky like confetti of a summer wedding, the gayest of colours so bright against a perfect sky. The silver linings of the clouds were being sliced by vast, beautiful wings, standing prominent in the empyrean.

The lay of the land was spread beneath him like a living map as he soared freely. Steep gullies, babbling streams and nascent rivulets snaked and curved across the rugged landscape like blue veins, providing the realm with a precious lifeblood that both nourished and provided.

It was peace itself ascending to the heavens, seeing the view usually bequeathed only to birds, their birthright and domain. He glided onwards, above snow-capped peaks and over lush verdant forests before finally turning back the way he came, the horizon now all but the familiar lands of his home. He began to lose height. The frigid wind curled around his aerodynamic frame and whipped his face until he eventually spied the entrance to his cave from afar and dove down towards it with the warm currents at his back.

 _I could do this forever._ Harry thought dreamily, memories of Quidditch games with his precious godfather Sirius rising to the surface of his mind.

The landscape's vibrant hues gradually transitioned to shades of sombre colours as he neared the trough in the valley that was the Withered Heath. Fire had tainted the earth grey, stripping the once-proud trees of their virescent beauty, leaving their gaunt, skeletal remains rooted to the barrel soil. They seemed to reach out to the sky like pallid, gnarled hands, as if desperate to latch on to the realm, whole again.

Despite the unfettered flames, blackened remains, and splintered bones, thrummed life.

Large nests and eyries that comprised of soft wood entwined with loose feathers were empty no longer. Gaping holes and dens in the side of the mountains, littered with tiny sparkling crystals not unlike the stars of the night sky, were abandoned no longer. Curious earthen and clayey abodes that were made from thickly felted plant fibres and compacted with mud dotted the river banks and were teeming with the first signs of activity.

This meant only one thing: breeding season was about to start.

This season of courtship and mating for the dragons was not annual as one would expect, but rather quinquennial – reoccurring only once every five years. From all across Middle-earth would the males of their species return from their journeys and adventures, where the most ferocious and virile of creatures would be impressing the newest generation of females, while the more scholarly and learned ones saw this period as an opportunity to spout wonderful and embellished stories of their findings and exploits to whomever chose to listen.

Unfortunately, his species was oviparous.

Now, in nature, the young of creatures that bear eggs are often less likely to survive against predator attacks, deadly temperature changes, and other environmental issues. To counter this unnecessary loss of life, the dragons throughout the Second Age had adapted accordingly, opting to stand in vigil during the perinatal periods of a mother's life and tending to their offspring until they could talk, fly and hunt independently.

This however, meant that parental care over time was eventually and inevitably consigned to the draconic matriarchs, leaving their mates free from duties to roam the world. In this day and age, once the males had cast their seed, they would leave and abandon the Withered Heath, carrying neither intellectual nor emotional attachment to their mate and progeny.

Harry had never met his father, but he didn't really care, for humans and dragons were different. His mind then paused, his mind flashing back through all his past lives and experiences. But were they truly different though? Both were sentient, both were cunning, both were cruel, both coveted shiny trinkets and baubles above all else, both were–

He shook his head, trying his best to clear dark thoughts that sought to cloud his mind.

Harry then gave a thoughtful chirp as he dived even lower, ignoring the aches and pains in his young muscles from flying continuously for the past three hours or so. He began to follow the meandering course of the river through the Withered Heath in one final burst of activity, twisting and turning in the air in a show of aerobatic display that only a Seeker could produce. Daring to fly close to the water, so close that he could see the smoothness of the black rocks underneath its rippled surface, he extended one wing and skimmed it carefully across the water's top, as if somehow reaching for a Golden Snitch.

Ever since he was deracinated from his old world and deposited in this strange land called _Ennor_ – the Sindarin name for this continent – he knew that there was no one who belonged in the air more than him. As the roaring wind whispered in his ears, the cool air caressed his face, and the rays of incandescent sunlight kissed his scales, he almost wished he had been born a dragon instead – not just his previous lifetime, but all the way back to his very first.

However, since this was his first flight, and he was daydreaming, naturally, he crashed.

A squawk of surprise issued from his jaws when one of his wings dipped too deeply into the water, causing him to tip forward and plunge head first into the river. A deluge of water rushed past his open mouth and down his gullet as a wave of ache and cracks in his bones accompanied it. Bright spots danced at the corners of his vision, temporarily blinding him and making his head feel like the thing inside of it was static as he sank like a stone to the silty surface of the river bed.

Strangely, his body didn't hurt as much as it should have. An overwhelming number of phantom pains that stemmed from his previous humanoid state of existence eventually gave way to a gentle numbness. Flexing his limbs while still underwater, he realized in surprise he could still move and began hastily swimming to the surface through the pristine mountain water.

A fit of wracking coughs was the first act he performed upon breaching the surface, interspersed between taking in deep gulps of air to steady his heaving chest. Fearing the worst, he hastily swam to the side of the river with powerful rhythmic strokes before propping himself up against a partially submerged rock to inspect the state of his body more closely. After a full minute of thorough checking, he came to an unsettling conclusion: the random cuts and bumps on his body were already showing the first signs of healing. Although he knew dragons were born with extremely fascinating abilities, he also knew that accelerated healing was definitely _not_ part of their repertoire.

A faint gasp of realization issued from his jaws as an epiphany hit him straight on like a truck. The cogs and spurs in his brain were turning faster than ever now, granting him an inkling as to what was happening.

Magic _._

It was here, in the midst of this strange world, that magic still flowed rampant and wild. A surge of energy coursed through his veins when he focused intensely with all the willpower he could muster, still familiar with the framework and nuances of magic from his prior experiences as a wizard. His efforts were rewarded as his eyes suddenly saw a faint shimmer burst into existence in front of his waking eyes, coating flora and fauna alike in a resplendent and glorious display.

He had been blind, but now he saw.

With a jolt, he realized that this type of magic was something fundamentally different from what he was so used to. Magic here was contained within the sights, sounds and smells of this world. Perhaps 'contained' was the wrong use for magic of this world, unlike his own, where such power had been dammed up and caged. Whereas his old world had gradients of magical power – steeped where witches and wizards were clustered, and sparse where Muggles dominated – every bird, rock, and tree in this land gave off susurrations of power instead, undulating in unseen waves that would have intoxicated him if he focused hard enough.

Here, it seemed as if magic was in symbiosis with reality.

Almost delirious with excitement from his accidental discovery, he tried to focus and channel this latent energy through his body to perform a feat of wandless magic, daring to touch the building blocks of which – unbeknownst to him – had set this very world in motion. However, the more he tried to reach out, the more the power retreated in turn, keeping him tantalizingly just a hairsbreadth away out of its touch.

Harry growled in infuriation at the denial of what was his birthright, but soon relinquished all his efforts after fruitlessly trying for a few more minutes.

"Why can I sense magic, but not touch it? Regardless of my situation or life, I could always harness it with relative ease," he muttered to himself, "Perhaps… it's because I'm in another world?"

A light bulb suddenly switched on in his head. He began to use a scaly claw to prod his chest at odd angles, clinically and systemically, as if trying to detect for abnormalities that lay on his being. After a minute of tense searching, a small smile crept onto his lips, relief flooding his system as he finally found a faint trace of what he had been look so hard for: his magical core. It still existed within him – albeit muted. Spinning and gyrating endlessly, his happiness was so great it seemingly transcended the mortal plane as his core spun ever faster.

Before he could continue any further, a wave of frigid numbness swept over his lower body without warning, causing him to look down blankly at a sea of blue that was rushing around his midriff. He then chuckled, only now remembering how he ended up in the watery mess.

"I hope no one saw me crash. Oliver Wood himself wouldn't have been too happy with my performance," Harry grinned widely, noting with faint interest that the twinkling that had once coated the world was now softly evanescing into albescent rays of sunlight.

Instead of quickly clambering out of the freezing mountain waters, he flopped back down into the crystal-clear liquid in a very undragonlike manner and floated lazily on his back, letting the slow current taking him back downstream as he let all thoughts drift out of his mind.

If an observer was present during his musings, the red dragonling would've been a most curious sight to behold.

Unfortunately, an observer was present – a group of them to be specific, and they heralded their presence with a cacophony of growls and hisses.

"What foul tongue did you just speak in?" a voice demanded out of the blue, speaking in the universal language of dragons, _Kulkodar-Flas._

Harry lifted his head out of the water from the noise, slightly annoyed that his meditations had been interrupted when he noticed who had spoken. He then temporarily ignored the speaker and began to leisurely swim over to the embankment of the winding river, taking his own sweet time and ignoring from the looks of perplexity he induced from his display of carefreeness.

He dragged his waterlogged body out of the water and shook himself like a wet dog, much to the disgust of his observers, before assessing the creatures before him.

There were three of them, one in the centre flanked by two others. He instantly recognized them as cold-drakes, or _Helka_ _lokë_. Though lacking the ability to breathe fire, they were nonetheless strong creatures after they were fully matured, with iron-hard scales, wicked claws, bold tails, and terrible fangs. The trio that stood before him however, had features absent of those aforementioned due to the fact that they were whelplings themselves and were only slightly older than he was.

His mind drifted, remembering a rare time when his mother told him a story of the world beyond these slopes, one of great war that raged merely two decades ago between the cold-drakes and the Dwarves that burrowed deep into the mountainous slopes of Ered Mithrin. It was a bloody and vicious conflict, one which culminated with death of the Dwarven king, Dáin I, and his son Frór in Thikil-gundu, 'The Steel Keep'. Bodies etiolated and spirit broken, the king's remaining sons fled their great halls with their people and were cast out from their homes into the frigid snow.

Even now, the exodus of the Dwarves to the Iron Hills, a range of great hills in the north-eastern regions of Ennor, continued. On the back of stirring breezes, there were also faint whispers that Thrór, a descendent of slain king, was leading some of his people to the abandoned subterranean city of Erebor, which lay beneath a lone mountain northeast to the forest of Mirkwood.

His mind snapped back to reality from issue of a guttural growl.

" _Ûrdínen._ Answer the question."

Harry gave a small frown when he heard his nickname: Ûrdínen. As all nicknames did, they originated from Quenya – the archaic language of the immortal Elves – and his roughly translated to 'the silent fire'.

"I spoke in a tongue called English, are any of you familiar with it?" he responded honestly in the same language, completely ignoring the hostile attitude.

The drake on the left spat at the ground in displeasure at his response, releasing a nebulous stream of ice that created a small frozen patch on the blackened ground.

"That tongue is a pain upon all who lack such familiarity," it growled back, "It grates on the ears and grinds on the heart. To think that you of all creatures would hoard such a treacherous display of linguistics. Your arrogance truly knows no bounds."

Harry raised an eyebrow in curiosity. Dragons were masters of riddles and wordplay, but these whelplings clearly still had a long way to go.

"Would you like to learn the fundamentals of English?" he asked in a kind voice, seeing through their ploy and getting straight to the point.

The drakes recoiled in surprise from his abrupt question.

"How dare you assume–" came a conflicted hiss.

Without waiting for an invitation, Harry promptly sat down on a dry rock and began to orate. The combination of his eccentric boldness, impressive oratory style, and flawless elocution shocked the other dragons into a stunned silence even long after he began. However, slowly but surely, the floodgates of their hearts opened, and they sat down and began to actively take part in his teachings, extremely vocal in some cases.

Harry was always acritical and patient. Despite having such a fiery disposition, he learnt that dragons were disturbingly persistent once they had made up their minds, not stopping for a second until they achieved their goal. This instinct also was applied most liberally to academic attainment, making him enjoy this little pedagogic role as the cold-drakes learnt in utmost earnest.

"Well done," he said proudly after two hours of rigorous study, a wide and triumphant smile stretching across his face, "I think that's all for today."

Shouts of protest made him chuckle out loud. He then gazed upon the trio of young dragons, eager for more knowledge with not a single affliction of life on their shoulders. A wave of compassion suddenly suffused through his body, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So, he began teaching them a great many other things.

Though dragons were cruel, greedy creatures that held only avarice in their hearts, their young were for the most part unaffected. He often wondered when did the bondage of Darkness settle upon their innocent and curious souls and turn them into the beasts that could only be satiated by the lustre of shining coins and gleam of dazzling jewels.

"You lot like gold and silver, don't you?" Harry suddenly interjected, completely halting the flow of the previous conversation.

"Of course, who doesn't?" one of the drakes answered without pause, a baffled look sprouting across its face as if unable to comprehend the concept of disliking precious metals.

"Well, if you keep killing the Dwarves, then who will be left to unearth minerals and craft such wonderful jewels?" Harry articulated slowly and clearly, "Dead miners and lapidarists would only hinder that of what you seek."

Looks of uneasiness took hold of the cold-drakes, "You... speak the semblance of truth, Smaug," the one in the middle hesitantly replied after a sustained silence.

They were no longer calling him by his nickname now.

"So?" Harry asked expectantly.

The drakes looked at him blankly.

"So?" they echoed back in confusion.

"So, stop killing them," Harry said simply, "Wouldn't it be more lucrative for you if you worked _with_ the Dwarves instead of–"

He cut himself off when his keen eyes realized with a start that it was nearly dusk. With a quick recap and a hasty goodbye, he turned on the spot and promptly left, slightly regretting that he couldn't fully arrive at the crux of the matter for he had a far more important task ahead of him. They called frantically to him, but he'd already taken flight and was gone with the wind, only realizing a few feet off the ground he had completely forgotten to get their names.

It didn't matter however, for the seed of change had already been planted within their hearts – his work was done for the day. As he flew silently in the air, his mind began to wander. If he could change the hearts of three dragons, surely, he could do so with his entire species. A sudden flash of insight filled him with courage and determination as an idea rose to the top of his mind.

Since ancient times, every civilization's ruler has had the same idea. When people unite under one will, they become stronger than the sum of their parts. And what do rulers use to bring people together?

Language.

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 **A/N:** If you have any thoughts at all, please drop a review! I read them all and will try to respond to anything related to the story accordingly. Thanks for being awesome!

Like in the Harry Potter universe, magic can be an 'external' flashy phenomenon, seen similarly from the Witch-king of Angmar's sorcerous abilities. However, further comparison of magic between Earth and Arda now becomes tricky, for Tolkien never explicitly defined magic, only that he categorized it into two divisions: Seen and Unseen magic, which are then both subcategorized into racial magics (though it's not really magic in the traditional sense). Without going into too much detail, we know that magic in Arda is not limited in quantity, but rather limited to its _users_. With this, we can assume that that magic is everywhere but simply not assessible to many. Harry, who is already extremely familiar with magic, can effortlessly sense this but not necessarily tap into it at this point in time.

Dear **Pack Rat** , I can understand how you can draw similarities between dragons and snakes, but remember dragons are not simple beasts, but are intelligent creatures with independent wills, consciousnesses, speech, and highly developed minds capable of leading armies into battle ( _The_ _Sack of Nargothrond, FA 495_ ). Dragons grow slow and take a long time to mature, so it would make logical sense to they will be completely helpless during the first few years of their lives and need care from others. Additionally, no matter how territorial a species is in nature, seasonal breeding does change the standard behaviour in animals (wolves are an exceptional case of this).

Just a heads up, this story will be split into three arcs for those who want a idea of the long term: 1) Harry's stay in the Withered Heath, 2) once he leaves home, and 3) his journey beyond.


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